Q. At a recent party I walked over to chat to my friend’s father. Because he was clearly wobbly (he’s about 90), I got two chairs for us to sit on. After a while I was keen to circulate but no one else came over to speak – probably because they, rightly, assumed that if they did I would take the chance to get up and leave them with him. It was suddenly time to go to our tables for supper and I ended up not having spoken to anyone else. What could I have done?

– O.M., Burnham Overy Staithe

A. You could have waved at an imaginary person behind your interlocutor. ‘Hello!’ you could have cried into the absence. Then springing up say: ‘Excuse me for a moment. I can see X wants to come and say hello.’ Targeting a cooperative fellow guest you could have returned to your cluster carrying – key feature – a third chair. After a decent interval you could have got up, leaving the third party to enjoy some heritage chat.

Q. My husband and I were giving lunch in St James’s to a rather important neighbour when we happened to run into our nephew. He is a truly exceptional young man so we had no qualms about inviting him to join us. Unfortunately my husband, out of nerves and being slightly drunk, kept steering the conversation towards subjects of relevance only to we three adults and our nephew was denied the chance to shine. My husband apologised later but I wonder: was there a way in which I could have shut him up at the time?

– J.A., London SW3

A. You should have raised your hand like a traffic warden and said: ‘May I interrupt while I confirm a boring code that’s come through on my iPhone?’ You would have then shown him a text reading: ‘Stop talking and give our nephew a chance.’ Even if he read it aloud it would have been funny, not embarrassing.

Q. I recently moved into a house in Shepherd’s Bush with four university friends. The rent is cheap (£800 a month) but I’m afraid my fears of moving into an all-male household have largely come true. The kitchen is in a permanent state of squalor, there is no dishwasher and I am consequently buying dinner out, which is costing around £14 a night. As I am the new addition to a household already set in its ways, I do not feel I can make a fuss. How can I orchestrate the desperately needed change?

– R.J., London W12

A. Hold up a postcard that reads ‘Local cleaner seeks work, £25 an hour’ and pretend it has come through the letterbox. Ask the four others do they want to pay £25 a week each so the kitchen is clear five nights a week and none of you has to go out to buy dinner. Collectively you could save around £200 a week so they should happily agree.